Second Battle of Congo
The Battle of Torch was an armed engagement between the Solarian League Navy's Maya Sector Detachment and the People's Navy in Exile, a rogue Havenite force employed by the Mesan Alignment. Prelude In order to regain control of the Torch System and its wormhole junction, the Mesan Alignment, using the Mesa System Navy, employed the People's Navy-in-Exile to conduct Operation Ferret, a kinetic bombardment of the planet Torch intended to sterilize the planet and in the process destroy the new Kingdom of Torch. That the planned action would be a violation of the Eridani Edict was not expected to be a problem, as it would be first, the responsibility of Havenite rogue units and second, there were plans to eliminate them after the action. The Maya Sector Detachment, however, learned of the deployment of the Havnite exile units and manged to deduce where they would be used. Its newly operational units arrived at Torch in time to defeat the attack, and having destroyed enough of the attacking units, cancel the planned bombardment. ( ) Order of Battle Solarian League Navy and Royal Torch Navy * "Hammer Force", CO - Rear Admiral Rozsak ** Light Cruiser Squadron 7036, SLN, CO - acting Commodore, Captain Dirk-Steven Kamstra ** Destroyer Squadron 3029, SLN * "Anvil Force", CO - acting Commodore, Commander Laura Raycraft ** Light Cruiser Division 7036.2, SLN, CO - Commander Laura Raycraft ** Destroyer Division 3029.1, SLN, CO - Lieutenant Commander Hjalmar Snorrason ** Destroyer Flotilla 2960, SLN, CO - Commander Maria LeFossi ** the frigate squadron of the Royal Torch Navy (Eight Nat Turner-class units) People's Navy in Exile * a battlecruiser element (Four Havenite Warlord-C-class units and ten Solarian Indefatigable-class units) - CO Citizen Commodore Adrian Luff * a heavy cruiser squadron (Eight Havenite Mars-D-class units) - CO Citizen Commodore Santander Konidis * a light cruiser squadron (Three Havenite units and five Solarian Bridgeport-class units) * a destroyer flotilla (Sixteen Solarian War Harvest-class units) Course of battle The action that would become known as the Battle of Torch commenced at 7:34, local time, with the arrival of the People's Navy in Exile one light second short of the Torch System's hyper limit at a velocity of 500 KPS and their immediate acceleration in-system on a least-time approach to Torch itself at a speed of 3.839 KPS-squared. Their arrival was immediately detected by the Royal Torch Navy frigate [[TNS Nat Turner|TNS Nat Turner]] and the news was passed to Admiral Luiz Rozsak, Solarian League Navy Frontier Fleet, Maya Sector Detachment, on board his flagship, the Marksman-class light cruiser [[SLNS Marksman|SLNS Marksman]] by priority message. Included in the message was the class IDs and numbers of each class of the PNE that Nat Turner's CIC had detected. Informed of the PNE's arrival by Lieutenant Karen Georgos while he was dining with Commander Edie Habib and Captain Dirk-Steven Kamstra, Rozsak expressed his admiration at the professionalism of Nat Turner s crew and ordered Kamstra to execute their Alpha Two deployment plan. Rozsak ordered Georgos to return to the flag deck, rousing the rest of his staff to assemble there, and proceeded to instruct Kamstra to extend his compliments to the Nat Turner for a job well done before Kamstra went to the command deck. Rozsak subsequently relocated to Marksman's flag deck and commented sourly that the size of the PNE formation was larger than they had expected. The sentiment was shared by Lieutenant Commander Thomas Szklenski, Marksman s executive officer, from Marksman's Auxiliary Control, especially at the presence of ten ex-Solarian battlecruisers in the formation. Lieutenant Robert Womack, Marksman s tactical officer, pointed out that at least they were ten Indefatigable-class battlecruisers and not the Solarian League's latest Nevada-class. While acknowledging Womack's point, Rozsak noted that while they were not top of the line units, the units they faced could still possess top-of-the-line Solarian electronics like those the PNE's Manpower/Mesan sponsors had provided to the Republic of Monica in their attempt to forment unrest in the Talbott Cluster. But, Habib noted that despite that the Solarian Indefatigables would still have weaker missile defenses than the Havenite Warlords present in the formation. Less than thirty minutes passed during the missile exchanges that occured between the units of Admiral Rozsak's Hammer Force, using Erewhonese Mark 17E missiles, and the Havenite battlecruisers, using Mesan Cataphract-A missiles. These exchanges resulted in the complete destruction of the Havenite battlecruisers, but with heavy loses to Hammer Force, with only four of its sixteen units surviving. Despite outnumbering the remaining forces of Admiral Rozsak's force, the remaining Havenite forces subsequently surrended when confronted by Anvil Force coming out to meet them from Torch with two more Marksman-class cruisers supported by the last ''Masquerade''-class arsenal ship. ( ) Aftermath The Battle of Torch saw the first combat use of ''Marksman''-, ''Warrior''-, and ''Masquerade''-class ships by the Maya Sector Detachment. The battle also saw the enlargement of the Royal Torch Navy with the transfer of captured PNE warships to it by the Maya Sector Detachment. ( ) References Torch, Battle of Torch, Battle of Torch, Battle of